Police staffing shortage a self-created problem

Express-News Editorial Board

Published 12:00 am, Saturday, November 25, 2017

Photo: John Davenport /San Antonio Express-News

Image 1of/1

Caption

Close

Image 1 of 1

The San Antonio Police Department's 2017C Cadet Class stands at attention July 31 during a welcoming ceremony at the San Antono Police Training Academy. A cadet class that began recently consists of more than 50 percent minorities and nearly 20 percent women and is the second of five classes planned for this year. less

The San Antonio Police Department's 2017C Cadet Class stands at attention July 31 during a welcoming ceremony at the San Antono Police Training Academy. A cadet class that began recently consists of more than ... more

Photo: John Davenport /San Antonio Express-News

Police staffing shortage a self-created problem

1 / 1

Back to Gallery

The city of San Antonio has been fervently digging itself out of a police staffing hole, but the question we have been wondering is, how did the city end up in such an unenviable position?

The short answer is that the city severely limited cadet academies during intense contract negotiations with the San Antonio Police Officers Association just as a wave of retirements hit the department. The city had a net loss of more than 100 officers between fiscal years 2014 and 2016.

There was only one police academy class in fiscal 2014, for example. That’s unfathomable for the nation’s seventh-largest city. That class graduated 22 cadets, but the city lost 56 officers, mostly due to retirement.

It was even worse in fiscal 2015. The city hosted two police academy classes, graduating 43 cadets. But it lost 101 officers.

The trend finally reversed in fiscal 2017 when the city graduated 126 cadets and the department lost 95 officers. Of course, by then, the staffing hole was pretty deep. At one point it had ballooned to 227 positions. On top of this, the city’s population grew by 81,000 people between 2013 and 2016, according to the U.S. Census Bureau. San Antonio’s population in 2016 was 1.493 million, the census has estimated.

Vacancies have been getting filled, and in an interview months ago, City Manager Sheryl Sculley and Police Chief William McManus expressed confidence the department will be fully staffed by spring or summer — as the city aggressively recruits cadets and holds more academy classes.

The shortage is tied directly to the protracted contract dispute over public safety health care costs. As contract negotiations dragged on, city staff recommended limiting cadet classes as a way to control those costs. There were other options, but in the end, City Council chose this route.

“The choice was given: Cut back on the budgeted street improvements. Cut back on public safety. Or raise taxes,” said Mayor Ron Nirenberg, who at that time was the District 8 councilman. “Of the three, we chose to do a little bit of one and two.”

He said the shortage hasn’t compromised public safety, and there is some evidence to support this. To bridge the gap, officers have filled in with overtime. City staff also provided statistics showing arrests are up and response times are down.

Still, this is hardly an ideal situation.

“The manager put herself in a huge deficit,” said Mike Helle, president of the San Antonio Police Officers Association.

In mid-August, Express-News reporter Emilie Eaton outlined the city’s efforts to improve police staffing, but she noted the city hasn’t kept up with growth. The officer-resident ratio was at one of the lowest points in the past 15 years.

There is no proper police-citizen ratio, numerous experts have said, so it’s hard to say if this is a big deal. But the inability to keep up with growth in San Antonio is striking.

In fiscal 2011, the city had 2,314 officers. In fiscal 2017, the city had 2,279 officers. During a time when the city’s population grew, it had fewer officers.

“I know we need more (officers),” Sculley told us. “We are a growing community. We have more calls for service, but it has to be affordable.”

This reliance on overtime has led Helle to worry about officer fatigue. As much as the officers might like the overtime they are receiving, Helle said he is concerned too much overtime could lead to poor decision-making and less proactive policing.

“Low amount of staffing means our guys work twice as hard to keep up with the call loads,” he said.

Then there is the question of crime.

In mid-October, Eaton reported that San Antonio ranked first in serious crimes — murder, aggravated assault, motor vehicle theft, rape, robbery, burglary, larceny-theft and arson — for all cities in 2016, according to FBI data. It’s a distinction the city disputes because there are a number of ways to measure crime and compare cities.

But between 2015 and 2016, violent and property crimes increased by 8 percent. Even if staffing levels have nothing to do with these crimes — there are so many variables, it’s hard to say — the increase speaks to the need for more police officers.

To better get a handle on these dynamics, we spoke with Larry Hoover, a professor with Sam Houston State University’s College of Criminal Justice. We showed him the city’s improved response times of more than six minutes for emergency calls and just under 18 minutes for nonemergency calls.

The benchmarks, he said, are five minutes and 15 minutes, respectively.

“It’s not enough to cause grave concern,” he said. “But it’s not at a level where it would really be desirable.”

More important, he said, is the question of whether officers are rushing through calls due to the staffing shortage. So, we checked it out. In a bit of good news, officers have been generally consistent in the time they spend on calls, city data show. In recent years, they appear, on average, to have spent more time handling calls.

All this suggests that Sculley and McManus are correct in saying the staffing shortage hasn’t undermined service. But, again, it’s not an ideal situation and has the feel of playing with fire. Hoover noted that some consequences of police staffing shortages are hard to measure: Leads might not be pursued, special units could go dormant or carry vacancies, there can be less proactive policing.

There are some backstories at play as well.

All of this occurred during a moment of heightened national tension around police tactics and use of force. Departments across the country have struggled with police-community tensions, and police have also been the targets of attacks, including a mass shooting in Dallas. All of this has hurt recruiting. And the city’s police contract dispute was a bruiser, hurting morale.

These issues aren’t necessarily going anywhere. Our concern is that when the next contract is up for negotiation, the fight will be just as protracted and ugly. The best policy prescription then is for SAPOA and city staff to set aside animosity and begin talking ideas. We know health care costs will be on the table again. We know the city will continue to grow. And we know more officers are needed.

That’s a difficult conversation to have. But it’s not one that should compromise staffing. Never again.